Bush tells US: I'm running

George W Bush, Republican governor of Texas and son of the former US president George Bush, announced his campaign for the presidency at the weekend, 17 months short of polling day.

Fortified by an already prodigious war-chest and a commanding lead in the opinion polls, he declared his hand during a swing through Iowa on Saturday which will take him to New Hampshire today: the two states which by tradition will hold the first primaries next spring.

He was greeted at each stop by forests of placards and banners and genuine enthusiasm from activists, but in many areas his supporters were outnumbered by the media army which constitutes one of his campaign's great advantages.

Yesterday he paused for an ostensibly private family reunion with his father in Kennibunkport, Maine, confident that the resulting photographs will help to strengthen his command of the headlines.

With well over 200 journalists dogging every step of his first campaign trip outside Texas, this was more like the closing stages of an election. His plane had barely touched down in Iowa before he made it clear that he regarded this as the first step on his road to the White House. "This exploratory business is over," he told cheering party workers in Des Moines. "I'm running. There's no turning back."

Dropping the polite fiction that he was only considering the job, he told Iowa Republicans: over a pork supper: "Today I announce loud and clear, I'm running for president of the United States."

He avoided policy specifics, but set out some broad themes, saying he would be "guided by conservative principles".

He offered a traditional Republican platform of federal tax cuts, increased military spending and social security privatisation. He promised a reform of tort law to protect business from civil litigation, and committed himself to free trade, which some of his party rivals oppose.

But he was conspicuously silent on some of the issues on which his Democratic rivals intend to concentrate their fire. He said nothing about abortion, gun control laws or reform of the political campaign finance laws. He also avoided comment on Kosovo.

His audiences included handfuls of supporters of other candidates, including Elizabeth Dole and Lamar Alexander, both of whom also campaigned in Iowa at the weekend, though with less financial support or media attention.

Many Republicans, however, seemed more than ready to give their blessing to a man who is relatively inexperienced and untested but carries a formidable pedigree and has made the party feel electable again.

Mr Bush's chief Democratic rival, Vice-President Al Gore, has been spurred by his poor showing in the polls to bring forward the formal launch of his own presidential bid from the autumn to this Wednesday, when he will make the announcement in his home town, Carthage, in Tennessee.

About this article

Bush tells US: I'm running

This article was published on
the Guardian website
at 03.34 EDT on Monday 14 June 1999.
It was last modified at 06.18 EDT on Saturday 4 October 2014.
It was first published at 03.34 EDT on Thursday 5 August 1999.